A Beginners Guide: 10 Ways to Optimize Landing Pages for Conversions

A landing page is a page on your website designed to convert visitors to leads, once they’ve filled out a form. The purpose of the content on a landing page is to drive visitors to fill out a form by offering incentives, calls to action and the benefits of your products, services or resources.

According to David Cancel, 98% of all website visitors will never come back to your website.

It is crucial that your landing pages are optimized efficiently to ensure that visitors return to your website and that the most amount of leads are entering the sales funnel for your business and eventually converting to a sale.

Make the most of your marketing spend that is driving traffic to your website by optimizing each landing page to convert the most traffic possible into quality leads.

1. Use a semi-extensive form on your landing page, simple enough to enter info easily, but thorough enough to capture qualified leads.

The forms on your website should be both simple and extensive. This is obviously contradictory, but the point is to aim for a healthy balance of both. Choose a simple form that makes it very easy for a visitor to sign up, while keeping in mind that if it is too easy to sign up for, some of your leads may not be qualified.

Look to incorporate four to ten fields on your forms, but start simple and continue to experiment to see what leads to more qualified conversions for your business. It is crucial that your form includes a field for a visitor’s first name, last name, email and phone number.

Fields like web address, company, title, country, how did you hear of us, industry and others could be added to the form depending on the goals of your lead generation. Choosing what fields to include is also impacted by the results of any testing performed to see how many fields is the right balance of ease of use and barrier to entry.

2. Feature a strong hero image at the core of your landing page.

Visuals help define how your business is presented by highlighting your unique advantage over competitors and distinct value to potential customers. Use a strong hero image on your landing page to help persuade a person to fill out the form. This image doesn’t have to be a beautiful women in an 8 million dollar dress, but it has to be a clean, clear and memorable image relating to the theme of the landing page and the overall aesthetic of your company.

The hero image on this landing page is both the tattoo shop in the foreground as well as the name of the organization “Tattoo Hero” in stylized font that is front and center. There are many different ways to feature a hero image on your landing page, but what is most important is that it is memorable and not distracting. This image could be anything from a featured product to the cover page of an eBook being offered. Experiment with the use of different images on your landing pages to see what resonates and what doesn’t with your audience.

3. Increase motivation for web visitors to sign up.

Motivate your web visitors to sign up by building their trust, as well as explaining the benefits of them signing up. Often referred to as “logo porn”, highlight the logos of clients you’ve worked with, the publications that have covered your business and other testimonials that give your company credibility on a landing page. By building trust with web visitors, it will be easier to motivate them to take an action on your page.

Motivation to sign up can be spurred by giving web visitors an understanding of what to expect once they fill out the form. This can come as a bulleted list, call to action or image that helps illustrate what they’ll get in return for providing your business with their personal information. If your company is upfront from the very beginning, your audience will build trust with you overtime.

4. Create a safety net for your page, even if a visitor doesn’t convert their first visit.

Many visitors will not convert when they first land on your website, but that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be other ways to stay in touch with them even if they don’t fill out the form. Create a safety net on your landing page to ensure your business keeps hold of the web visitors in some form.

You can open an opportunity to stay connected for the future by having a follow us on Twitter button or a free download that doesn’t require filling out a form on your landing page. Using one of these tactics will help connect you with your web visitors with the hope of converting them to customers in the future.

5. Make your website mobile friendly.

A mobile friendly website is necessary to accurately view your landing pages from a variety of devices. Right away conversions will begin to increase from mobile devices when your website and landing pages are optimized to suit different experiences.

Responsive design is the best approach when it comes to making your landing pages mobile friendly, but launching a mobile version of your existing website is an option as well. As another option, many email and landing page service providers offer landing page templates that are hosted off your website and are mobile friendly as well.

6. Alter the main navigation bar.

Limiting your top level navigation bar at the top of your landing pages will help remove any other distractions from the view of a web visitor, helping them focus on filling out your form. Some experts advocate that your main navigation bar should disappear completely on a landing page, while others say it should be kept like it always is, but I would argue that it should be present at the top of the screen but with less options.

Removing as many distractions as possible from a landing page can help drive more conversions to your form. The removal of the navigation bar completely could confuse web visitors and appear deceptive since it isn’t limiting the ways to exit the landing page. The best rule of thumb for this tip is to balance the limitation of distractions with the usability of the landing page.

7. Keep the aesthetic and messaging as simple as possible.

This tip is present in all the others above because it is a crucial element of every part of a landing page. The golden rule is to keep it simple. If your landing pages are overcrowded with information and visuals then no one is going to convert because they are way too distracted with options.

Include relevant copy, calls to action, social media integration, visuals and a form on your landing pages to present the right amount of information to assist in a conversion. The example above is a landing page from Square that helps to stress that simplicity is the right approach for converting visitors to leads.

A/B testing is an important part of landing page optimization to help your business understand what works and what doesn’t work with your web visitors. Test two to three different versions of your landing pages to understand what elements of each landing page work best in assisting a conversion. There are many A/B testing tools available to help perfect the process of creating effective landing pages.

Begin by testing different images, the arrangement of text, the location of the sign up form, the removal or addition of certain items and the manipulation of other elements on the page that could impact the experience of web visitors. Once you’ve discovered which landing page elements convert better, begin applying them to your landing page optimization across your entire website. A/B testing never ends, continue to experiment with a range of different templates to continually improve your efforts and increase conversions overtime.

Interested in generating leads with landing pages? Jumplead is a great tool for creating and managing landing pages. Start generating leads with landing pages and conversion forms. Try Jumplead today!

9. Focus on the right keywords, synched with your advertising campaigns and on-page call to actions.

Analyze what keywords are drawing traffic to your website from the search engines, while also keeping in mind which keywords your business is trying to rank for and then apply this list of keyword phrases organically throughout your landing pages. Synching your calls to action with relevant keywords in a natural, organic way will help your website rank for the right terms that your potential customers are searching for.

SEO or search engine optimization typically yields results in the long-term, taking anywhere from three, six or twelve months to show actionable rankings that drive revenue. Stick to a strict keyword strategy that focuses on multiple long-tail keyword phrases that are relevant to your business and related to the type of customers you are looking to attract. By creating engaging landing pages that provide value to your audience, while incorporated with the right keywords, you’ll be able to better optimize your efforts for the search engines.

10. Enable social sharing of your landing page to spread the word.

Add social media plugins to your landing page to allow web visitors to share the link to this resource with their network. The most relevant social sharing buttons to add to your landing pages would be a mix of the following:

Facebook’s Share or Like Button

LinkedIn’s Share Button

Twitter’s Tweet Button

Google+ 1 Button

Pinterest’s Pin It Button

Keep the amount of social sharing buttons limited since it is important to keep the page design simple. Choose a few or all of the above social plugins to help spread the word of the resources and services your company provides.

11. BONUS: Assist your lead’s journey through the sales funnel.

Using the Jumplead landing page software a lead’s information can be compiled into one consistent profile from multiple sources such as a landing page. For instance, once a web visitor converts by filling out a form on your website that information is gathered and stored in a profile detailing all the data compiled about them that they submitted through your form. If that same user returns again and fills out a different form, then this information is also added to their profile to help paint a complete picture of the lead and store all the data compiled about them in one place. The more information your company has about a lead, the more personalized your communication with them can be as they move closer to becoming a customer.

Through this compiled data, a quality score is generated in the Jumplead backend to help sales and marketing determine where time should be spent dealing with the most qualified leads for your business. After certain actions occur, like when a person fills out a form or they return to fill out a second or third form, email auto responders can be set up to reach out to leads at the appropriate place in the sales funnel and save time. These auto responders act as an automatic follow up with a lead to see if they need to jump on a call, if they need more information or whatever response makes sense based on the event their actions triggered in the sales funnel.

A landing page is a page on your website designed to convert visitors to leads, once they’ve filled out a form. The purpose of the content on a landing page is to drive visitors to fill out a form by offering incentives, calls to action and the benefits of your products, services or resources.

According to David Cancel, 98% of all website visitors will never come back to your website.

It is crucial that your landing pages are optimized efficiently to ensure that visitors return to your website and that the most amount of leads are entering the sales funnel for your business and eventually converting to a sale.

Make the most of your marketing spend that is driving traffic to your website by optimizing each landing page to convert the most traffic possible into quality leads.

1. Use a semi-extensive form on your landing page, simple enough to enter info easily, but thorough enough to capture qualified leads.

The forms on your website should be both simple and extensive. This is obviously contradictory, but the point is to aim for a healthy balance of both. Choose a simple form that makes it very easy for a visitor to sign up, while keeping in mind that if it is too easy to sign up for, some of your leads may not be qualified.

Look to incorporate four to ten fields on your forms, but start simple and continue to experiment to see what leads to more qualified conversions for your business. It is crucial that your form includes a field for a visitor’s first name, last name, email and phone number.

Fields like web address, company, title, country, how did you hear of us, industry and others could be added to the form depending on the goals of your lead generation. Choosing what fields to include is also impacted by the results of any testing performed to see how many fields is the right balance of ease of use and barrier to entry.

2. Feature a strong hero image at the core of your landing page.

Visuals help define how your business is presented by highlighting your unique advantage over competitors and distinct value to potential customers. Use a strong hero image on your landing page to help persuade a person to fill out the form. This image doesn’t have to be a beautiful women in an 8 million dollar dress, but it has to be a clean, clear and memorable image relating to the theme of the landing page and the overall aesthetic of your company.

The hero image on this landing page is both the tattoo shop in the foreground as well as the name of the organization “Tattoo Hero” in stylized font that is front and center. There are many different ways to feature a hero image on your landing page, but what is most important is that it is memorable and not distracting. This image could be anything from a featured product to the cover page of an eBook being offered. Experiment with the use of different images on your landing pages to see what resonates and what doesn’t with your audience.

3. Increase motivation for web visitors to sign up.

Motivate your web visitors to sign up by building their trust, as well as explaining the benefits of them signing up. Often referred to as “logo porn”, highlight the logos of clients you’ve worked with, the publications that have covered your business and other testimonials that give your company credibility on a landing page. By building trust with web visitors, it will be easier to motivate them to take an action on your page.

Motivation to sign up can be spurred by giving web visitors an understanding of what to expect once they fill out the form. This can come as a bulleted list, call to action or image that helps illustrate what they’ll get in return for providing your business with their personal information. If your company is upfront from the very beginning, your audience will build trust with you overtime.

4. Create a safety net for your page, even if a visitor doesn’t convert their first visit.

Many visitors will not convert when they first land on your website, but that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be other ways to stay in touch with them even if they don’t fill out the form. Create a safety net on your landing page to ensure your business keeps hold of the web visitors in some form.

You can open an opportunity to stay connected for the future by having a follow us on Twitter button or a free download that doesn’t require filling out a form on your landing page. Using one of these tactics will help connect you with your web visitors with the hope of converting them to customers in the future.

5. Make your website mobile friendly.

A mobile friendly website is necessary to accurately view your landing pages from a variety of devices. Right away conversions will begin to increase from mobile devices when your website and landing pages are optimized to suit different experiences.

Responsive design is the best approach when it comes to making your landing pages mobile friendly, but launching a mobile version of your existing website is an option as well. As another option, many email and landing page service providers offer landing page templates that are hosted off your website and are mobile friendly as well.

6. Alter the main navigation bar.

Limiting your top level navigation bar at the top of your landing pages will help remove any other distractions from the view of a web visitor, helping them focus on filling out your form. Some experts advocate that your main navigation bar should disappear completely on a landing page, while others say it should be kept like it always is, but I would argue that it should be present at the top of the screen but with less options.

Removing as many distractions as possible from a landing page can help drive more conversions to your form. The removal of the navigation bar completely could confuse web visitors and appear deceptive since it isn’t limiting the ways to exit the landing page. The best rule of thumb for this tip is to balance the limitation of distractions with the usability of the landing page.

7. Keep the aesthetic and messaging as simple as possible.

This tip is present in all the others above because it is a crucial element of every part of a landing page. The golden rule is to keep it simple. If your landing pages are overcrowded with information and visuals then no one is going to convert because they are way too distracted with options.

Include relevant copy, calls to action, social media integration, visuals and a form on your landing pages to present the right amount of information to assist in a conversion. The example above is a landing page from Square that helps to stress that simplicity is the right approach for converting visitors to leads.

A/B testing is an important part of landing page optimization to help your business understand what works and what doesn’t work with your web visitors. Test two to three different versions of your landing pages to understand what elements of each landing page work best in assisting a conversion. There are many A/B testing tools available to help perfect the process of creating effective landing pages.

Begin by testing different images, the arrangement of text, the location of the sign up form, the removal or addition of certain items and the manipulation of other elements on the page that could impact the experience of web visitors. Once you’ve discovered which landing page elements convert better, begin applying them to your landing page optimization across your entire website. A/B testing never ends, continue to experiment with a range of different templates to continually improve your efforts and increase conversions overtime.

Interested in generating leads with landing pages? Jumplead is a great tool for creating and managing landing pages. Start generating leads with landing pages and conversion forms. Try Jumplead today!

9. Focus on the right keywords, synched with your advertising campaigns and on-page call to actions.

Analyze what keywords are drawing traffic to your website from the search engines, while also keeping in mind which keywords your business is trying to rank for and then apply this list of keyword phrases organically throughout your landing pages. Synching your calls to action with relevant keywords in a natural, organic way will help your website rank for the right terms that your potential customers are searching for.

SEO or search engine optimization typically yields results in the long-term, taking anywhere from three, six or twelve months to show actionable rankings that drive revenue. Stick to a strict keyword strategy that focuses on multiple long-tail keyword phrases that are relevant to your business and related to the type of customers you are looking to attract. By creating engaging landing pages that provide value to your audience, while incorporated with the right keywords, you’ll be able to better optimize your efforts for the search engines.

10. Enable social sharing of your landing page to spread the word.

Add social media plugins to your landing page to allow web visitors to share the link to this resource with their network. The most relevant social sharing buttons to add to your landing pages would be a mix of the following:

Facebook’s Share or Like Button

LinkedIn’s Share Button

Twitter’s Tweet Button

Google+ 1 Button

Pinterest’s Pin It Button

Keep the amount of social sharing buttons limited since it is important to keep the page design simple. Choose a few or all of the above social plugins to help spread the word of the resources and services your company provides.

11. BONUS: Assist your lead’s journey through the sales funnel.

Using the Jumplead landing page software a lead’s information can be compiled into one consistent profile from multiple sources such as a landing page. For instance, once a web visitor converts by filling out a form on your website that information is gathered and stored in a profile detailing all the data compiled about them that they submitted through your form. If that same user returns again and fills out a different form, then this information is also added to their profile to help paint a complete picture of the lead and store all the data compiled about them in one place. The more information your company has about a lead, the more personalized your communication with them can be as they move closer to becoming a customer.

Through this compiled data, a quality score is generated in the Jumplead backend to help sales and marketing determine where time should be spent dealing with the most qualified leads for your business. After certain actions occur, like when a person fills out a form or they return to fill out a second or third form, email auto responders can be set up to reach out to leads at the appropriate place in the sales funnel and save time. These auto responders act as an automatic follow up with a lead to see if they need to jump on a call, if they need more information or whatever response makes sense based on the event their actions triggered in the sales funnel.